Social Media Evolution: Twitter

While I put off studying for my last go around of finals as an undergrad at Drake University, I’ve been thinking back on my four years here at Drake. Now there will be a reflection blog post next week at some point about how my time at Drake has opened up so many doors for me, but one thing that has changed tremendously has been the use of social media.This first post will be about as one of my professors calls it “The Twitter”.

When I entered college in the fall of 2008, everyone was on Facebook and friending everyone on their floor just to gain more connections at their new school. I did this as well, but then also heard about this thing about Twitter from my Resident Assistant at the time. Being a news and sports reporter for the Times Delphic, I picked a handle and started to follow campus and sports news on it, but didn’t use it a whole lot. Fast forward to today, May 5, when I’m writing this and I have accumulated over 5,500 tweets and have over 300 followers. Not to shabby for a guy who almost gave up Twitter his sophomore year.

In fact, I can’t imagine my world without Twitter, as it has become a way not only to connect with classmates, but also to get the latest and best news. Being a 49ers fan in the Midwest, Twitter is how I am able to keep track on what my favorite five-time Super Bowl Champions are doing by following the beat reporters of the team. I also do this with the Milwaukee Brewers, as we don’t hear a lot of Brewers news in Iowa.

Twitter also helps me follow sport scores while I am no where near a TV, and many of the updates come before a score application would show the update. I came up with this idea for the blogpost while I was sitting at a coffee shop while studying and followed the Milwaukee Brewers game not through text updates, the ESPN Gamecast or listening to the radio broadcast, but by checking my phone for tweets from the Brewers beat guys. I’m also able to check the score of the Drake Bulldog softball game at the same time by not having to switch sites but by just scrolling down on my feed.

This customization is the beauty of Twitter, which makes it so much different from going to a straight news site for the latest happenings in the world. When I go to ESPN, I don’t care about what the New York Yankees are doing, or what injury has happened to the Chicago Bulls or the New York Knicks. I want to know how the Milwaukee Brewers are doing, how my 49ers are doing and how great Dwayne Wade is for the Miami Heat.

With all of this news, I am still able to keep tabs on what my friends on the social network are up to. I think this will become even more valuable after I graduate from college and get a job as I will be able to follow what the people I spent my undergraduate career with. I hope that some of my friends from high school will also hop on Twitter, as it is becoming a bigger news source for me in comparison to Facebook. Twitter allows me to shift through the noise or news I don’t care about to get the news that I care about, which makes my time on Twitter more efficient.